Monday, June 23, 2008

My man Francis Holland has this theory about racism. He doesn't think it exists. He thinks racism is the wrong word to use when describing one races dislike for the other. Francis thinks it's a false term as we are all a part of the same race (humans), therefore we cannot be racist towards one of our own. Francis, instead, calls the phenomenon Extreme Color ArousalDisorder, or ECAD. Now I must admit that when I first read this theory by Francis I thought he was nuts. But now.....I am not so sure. I think Francis might be on to something. People do tend to do irrational things and act against their own best interests when they are color aroused.

Take the latest Wapo poll which finds that three in ten A-merry-cans still have some issues with race. Now three out of ten might not be a bad average if you are a baseball player. A life time 300 bating average can get you into the hall of fame. But here in the land of the [not]so free and the home of the [some are] brave that number just doesn't seem so right now does it. After all, this is A-merry-ca. Aren't we above those silly racial distinctions? Isn't this where we expect to be able to live a life where we can be judged by the content of our character?

Of course this poll is all centered around the "O" man and his historic run for the highest office in the land. All the pollsters want to know what's really on the minds of A-merry-cans when it comes to the "O" mans's complexion. Is there really ECA when it comes to the "O" man? Let me answer that for you: yes. And I suspect that the real number is more like five out of ten A-merry-cans are a little uncomfortable with the "O" man's race. They say he is "risky", he is unproven, he is still unknown......let's keep it real. The real problem is that he is black. (At least to them) Hell who knew Ronald Reagan, or Jimmy Carter, or JFK for that matter, before they all came on the National scene? Of course we didn't really know them, but we knew they were white, and that was quite comforting to us now wasn't it?

But that Obama fellow, not only doesn't he look like us he has a funny Muslim name. Now if that doesn't make him a "risky" ass pick I don't know what does. But is he riskier than Mr. Morton?

What did Francis say about acting against your interest if you are color aroused again? Hmmmm, I think I see some of that here.

Now I have been saying all along that there is no way in that little place the devil calls home that A-merry-cans will select the "O" man as their leader. And this poll gives ammunition to my position. We all know that when it comes to race people taking the polls try to be PC with the pollsters, and they ultimately end up lying about how they really feel. I suspect that happened here as well.

Now Mr. Morton and his crew are doing everything in their powers to be on the losing side of history. To stay with my baseball analogy, they want to be the pitcher that serves up number 763. How else do you explain all the fucking up they have been doing lately? And not to mention all the goofy ass ideas that Mr. Morton has been trotting out there. Is he even Okay? What is that shit on top of his head? Everyone has been worrying about the "O" man surviving this election season for obvious reasons. But we need to start worrying about Mr. Morton's ass.

I have to confess, I get extreme color aroused sometimes. When I see the color brown it reminds me of all the bullshit that I have had to endure for the past eight years. I keep telling myself that the frat boy nightmare is almost over, and the country will be back to normal again. But given the two choices how can we go back to normal? If the "O" man wins ECA will rule the day. And if Mr. Morton wins.....well, just make sure your wills are in order.

Hmmm well there is a scientifically proven color therapy but Mr. Holland also thinks R Kelly did no wrong so I can't really give that man too much attention. If Obama wins it will be despite the corporate media trying it's best to prop up McSame. Color arousal sounds sexual or food based not relating negatively to a person based on a limited perception.

The picture on the sidebar of people lined up in Milwaukee for food is a sad comment on life in these here United States of America.

Kinda' reminds me of the nightmare of post-Katrina Nawlins. People who could, cued for water and food. People who couldn't cue, didn't eat and they didn't drink water.

Food is so expensive today. A loaf of bread in Wegmans (our local grocery store) is $3.49 and it ain't even the fancy-shmancy bread. Bell peppers $1.99 a lbs., and a box of Barilla spaghetti is $1.19. It adds up fast. We're paying more and we're getting less.

Did you notice how the WaPo poll numbers of 3 in 10 correlates with the remaining 29% who are Bush supporters? I live in a rebel flag waving southern red state, and that asinine T-shirt you exhibit heralds from a bar just down the road from here. These clowns are not suffering from anything as eloquent as ECAD -- they'll tell you straight up, they hate uppity negros (and anyone else who isn't a mirror image of themselves). Especially when said uppity negro possesses a higher IQ than their collective family's.

It's gonna be a long, hard row to hoe.

And while I have high hopes for a positive outcome, considering the mess Obama will inherit if elected, he may well end up being blamed for all the ills set into motion by the current administration. (A la Carter.) Setting up successors for failure is the NeoCon way. Why, then, do they field such a weak candidate? And how easy it will be to then blame it on the field hand; thereby reverting decades of hard fought advancements.

Watch these NeoCon fuckers -- they employ think tanks chocked full of traitorous subversives and cannot be trusted.

I think some of the neo-cons are going to humanly combust if Obama wins. Lately, they have been totally losing it on the talks shows I've watched - I mean, going off on these tangents, completely off subject - the host and the liberal counterpart kinda sitting very still with a "no sudden movement" look.

McCain's campaign is in serious trouble. They are counting on those with color arousal issues to put him in the White House.

Meanwhile here (in Italy) there is so much positive press and interest about Obama. I haven't experience any anti-American comments but the majority of folks here HATE Bush. Even those who support Berslusconi. The war in Iraq was/is very unpopular. People asked me all the time how could he get reelected? After Bersluconi came back no one asks me that any more. ha.

~Nice vignette on NPR yesterday about Korea. It would seem that some Koreans see themselves as a different race/a superior race than/to Chinese, Japanese, Mongolians, Vietnamese, et alia. Must be the well bromide(d) shades of gray, er, yellow.

What a way to get the morning started. I agree with Francis Holland, to a certain extent. I do think we are all humans. I'm sure many people feel the same. But I think the problems arrive, once people lose touch with reality. And they form and actually believe their own self-servings to the extent where reality has absolutely nothing to do with it anymore. Only the lies which have manifested.

If they feel a certain way towards blacks, then that's what they roll with. Education and earned respect has nothing to do with it. LOL.

I will no longer declare a race on-line. People must deal with me on my terms or live with the fact that however, they see me is what they are projecting on to me not what I am declaring. It is one of the few feelings of empowerment that I can cling to.It is my own personal experiment, but I was inspired by Holland.It may be isolating at times because people want to know if you are with them or not. Not is it only isolating but I am often attacked for it, ignored, criticised and accused. Yet to be accepted in a group is to be defined by their rules which means you must answer, act, respond in the way they expect someone in their particular group to answer, act, respond. For you see, people of color, particularly blackl people are not of the mindset or intelligence to allow for individuality.A lot of people already deal with this shit every day in real life. For once I wished for a time in my life where I can just be raceless, and as it happened, last night was it!

I was driving home alone yesterday (during the day of course, because I dare not drive at night; men are out at night, and men rape!).I was a little tipsy from the office party we had at the nonprofit (I only drink Brandy or wine) and I was stopped by a squad car because I swerved! I knew I was going to get harassed because of my damned "race", but I suddenly thought to truly and experiment! What if I closed my eye and wished myself to be raceless?!?!?!?Immediately I began to feel the melanin particles lift from my (still toned) body like so many bubbles from a submerged Alka-Selter tab and I was raceless! Thin lips, no eye color, no history of oppression or being oppressed! Oh, the freedom!When I opened my eyes the male police officer just gave me a vocal warning! Can you believe that? All praise is due to the positivity of raceless thinking! See how it stands in the way and is a barrier? This is why I cannot stand most “anti-racists” that I read. So many define a race on an expected behavior, an expected treatment, an expected whatever. In my opinion, it demands, demands that all people other than white be a group and never an individual. I have learned that this whole meager experiment of mine has really really pissed some people off. There are people who just cannot stand that a person is demanding to be raceless!. Talk about maintaining the status quo. Whatever.

The Wapo poll's intersection of results into their "racially sensitive" categories was interesting stuff. I couldn't find the article on your link. Found it here:http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/06/21/AR2008062101825.html

That 29% sheds some light on the Father's Day speech, though, doncha think?

I suspect that, though you liked it, his speech didn't sway YOU toward the Obama camp. (Musta been something else.)

The poll's "racially sensitive index" was described as revealing attitudes "independent of partisan identification."(dr. know, did the poll call that 29% "Bush supporters" or was that your interpretation?)

"Racially sensitive whites" went for Obama by a wide margin. Those whites who showed a "low sensitivity" to race, Field, are probably your PC answering crowd. I wonder if there is a strategy aimed at making Bubba (the white one) more "racially sensitive" That would make for some subtle persuasion. Great hyper-analytic food!

Hey nsangoma! Koreans are taught to be UBER "race"/cultural supremacists! Not exactly the ECA Disorder you suffer from, but similar, no?

Well now. I've got to investigate Extreme Color Arousal Disorder (ECAD) as I like the coining of new phrases describing old, never-will-die isms.

As for the other - let's not be overly-confident about Obama winning the WH; he's got a lot of white folk - including so-called fundamentalist christian religious right folk, Turd Blossom, traditional media, his FISA stand, the dust up he's creating with James Dobson re bible interpretation (my 2 cents? both are wrong since scripture says the Bible isn't up for private interpretation), and fidgety "liberal" whites who get upset when Obama proves himself to be the consummate pol that he is, and not their personal puppet on strings. (1 Pet 1 says, [20] Knowing this first, that no prophecy of the scripture is of any private interpretation.[21] For the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man: but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost.)

Make no mistake - I'm working for him to win, I want to see him in the WH partly because the wicked part of me wants to see neo-con heads explode 209 days from now, on inauguration day. But I'm not taking his win for granted because it's gonna be tough. He's already getting extreme negative coverage for opting out of public financing, while McMorton the Drama Queen is getting a pass for taking out loans borrowed against the $80 million he's taking from public financing.

Oh and I didn't even mention the elected jigging Negroes who don't have his back, as well as the Clintons, who are still smarting about their loss and are out to get him.

Intellectually, Francis Holland is right. However, giving what I know about human nature, human beings will always find something to distinguish themselves. It's about being a part of a group. Even within the black community with distinctions for example, Barack Obama where saw Debra Dickerson on the Colbert Report saying that he is not African-American because he is not a descendent of slaves.

I have to say that in general human beings are pity and weird because we use irrational premises and ideas to make one group more superior than the other. We do it for ecomonic and political reasons. We also form organization such as club for a sense of belonging. There is a paradox when we as a society promote the idea of individualism, but a psychological need to belong to a group where others look and think like us. Anything that is different, we tend to be very uncomfortable because it's unfamiliar. Sometimes we embrace the difference, but more often we reject it.

Perhaps the late George Carlin was when he said in an interview that people will not solve the problem of race, but George came from a generation that was so entrenched in racial prejudice that perhaps could not see it changing in his lifetime. However, race does diminish with generation moving forward that it's possible that the idea of race will die out when past generation do the same.

"Nice vignette on NPR yesterday about Korea. It would seem that some Koreans see themselves as a different race/a superior race than/to Chinese, Japanese, Mongolians, Vietnamese, et alia. Must be the well bromide(d) shades of gray, er, yellow."

Nsangoma I listened to that NPR piece and I didn't get that impresssion.

Seems like S. Korea is trying to cope with "multiculturalism" in a formerly homogeneous society--like the issues with immigrants in countries like Sweden and Denmark.

The "us" against "them" where the "us" feels like they are being taken over by the "them".

Physical Anthropologist have being saying for decades that there is no such thing as race--only genes that express themselves in different ways--there is no specific white/black/hispanic gene. Those designations are cultural. So on that note Francis is correct.

Now can people experience ECA from interactions with persons of their own race?

My first mind says yes and thus leaves me to believe that people establish perceptions based on their experiences or lack thereof.

Which in a circular fashion reinforces their ideas about people who they think are different. You can rationalize anything around your own perspective and noone can tell you it's wrong if it matches your experiences.

From what I understand of the NPR on All Things Considered is that Koreans believed the myth that they came from the one bloodline. Koreans are homogenous in terms of culture. Chinese and Koreans have different cultural morales. Different religions, customs, and societal rules. They are two different ethnic groups, but we humans use the word race. There is a great documentary called "Race: The Power of Illusion that ran on PBS a few years ago along with a book entitled with the same name. The reality is that modern humans - all of us - emerged from Africa about 150,000 to 200,000 years ago with bands human migrating out of Africa only 70,000 years ago. So there is only one race and we distinguished ourselves as ethnic groups.

Here is my personal observation concerning this topic. All human beings are related. They are like children fighting over who got the biggest piece of pie. Only one of the children does not want to share the pie. That child wants the whole pie, because he is greedy, selfish, and a glutton. In addition, he is a bully. Naturally, this causes a big mess with the rest of the children, because the other children are not going for it. Therefore, it starts a fight, because the other children want their equal share of the pie. All of the other children plan to fight to the end, until they get their equal piece of the pie.

I went and looked at PBS's site for Race: The Power of Illusion. It is very interesting and interactive. It does boil down to the fact that we are all the same race, just different mutations. We are even all related to each other from way back when. If you slam someone for their color or "race" then you are slamming a family member. Not too pretty, but then again, not everyone in every family gets along. So, there you go. What are we gonna do except try to get along and lift each other up as much as possible.

I am a woman in a man's field, in industrial construction. Every opportunity I get to lift another qualified (and I mean qualified) woman up a notch or two, I do it. If I am given the choice between an unqualified woman or a qualified man, I pick the man because I can't afford not to have someone who understands what needs to be done. I have promoted men and women, but because I work in a male dominated field, it is natural that I have had to promote more men than women.

A little off topic, but the race thing is getting to me. As Rodney King said, "Why can't we just all get along?"

There's nothing we can do to change those dumb biggoted old white men and women. The best we can do is make sure that we get Mr. Obama in the White House. Then, perhaps by example, some of these turds will change their minds.

My husband's uncle (who is a 70 year old Cajun) is gung-ho for Obama. How about that? I think there's quite a few of 'em in the South, just stay closeted. Hell, the Democrats are afraid to say so in public down there!

Holland reflects the scientific view, in which concept of "race" is increasingly disproven & discredited. Racism becomes an inaccurate term if there are no races per se & the problem in America is actually a matter of skin color; the prejudice exists against a dark-skinned person no matter what that person's ancestral origins.

Omi and winant have a great book about race as both REAL and ILLUSION...it's both. It's real in its manifestations...because racism DOES exist...it's historically entrenched, regardless of the scientific fact that there is no such thing as race.

here's some excerpts:http://aad.english.ucsb.edu/docs/Omi-Winant.html

Unfortunately racism is not as simple as skin-color discrimination.

Great example - Gregory Williams wrote a book called Life on the Color Line ...he was a white looking kid who moved to a city where people knew his father was part black and he was treated as a black person.

plus as yall know it's not as simple as "i don't like you because you're dark skinned" - individual racism manifests through projections and associated qualities from dress to carriage to behavior, etc. And that's not to mention systemic institutionalized racism which can't be simplified to not liking someone based on skin color.

I'm a white woman who has never "clutched my pocketbook" or been freaked out by color. I have traveled all over the world and spent a lot of time in Kingston, living with a family of 11 in Shanty Town.

I actually don't get color issues, at all. Period. I get pissed off when people judge me by my color and I get pissed off when other people judge people by their color. Period. It is stupid and obsessive. We have to come to some sort of parity, period. We have got to unite for the right from the wrong. I may be stupid and naive; perhaps I am. But I do understand the anger of black folks for being assumed to be criminals "just because." White folks are assholes and presume that they rule the world.

I live in Eastwick, a burg of Philly. I am in the minority. And, I must say, that I absolutely think my neighbors are great. We watch out for each other and greet each other when we meet at the local Shop Rite. All of my neighbors are wonderful, quiet and respectful. A lot of us are of the same age, 50's through 70's, and none of us think we are less or better than the other.

There have been times when I forgot to lock my door and I have never been robbed or raped. There is a world out there where all races can co-exist. Though my neighborhood is predominately black, we do have a mix of white, Asian, East Indian and other races. It is lovely. Just like when I was growing up in Chicago. One big racial soup. And, the tastiest soup that ever was!

I will miss Philly when I move next month to the hot hell of Mississippi, but I look forward to the down home cooking and all of those crawfish and Creole, Cajun treats. And, all of the wonderful black folks that I will be neighbors with.

I have had the opportunity to speak with and to listen to Brother Holland. This Brother is deep. Initially one might not agree with his view on a topic, but he really can lay argument out there that will give you another side to marinate in.

Yes, we are The Human Race, which encompasses all kinds of kookooberries, freaks, nuts, and HATERS. Increasingly our ills are manifesting themselves at a much faster and profound rate.

OK, so we don't call it Racism....We for damn sure can call it Dangerous !

I never had to clutch my pocketbook either, Whitney. Well...there is one exception, and that's with those people always trying to sell me something over the phone, and claiming the product their offering is free. Now, that's when I hold on tight to my pocketbook. Granny likes those big purses, and my grandchildren tell me if I went on Let's Make A Deal, they guaranteed me I'd win. (smile)

I got to see the car you were talking about. But it is a little too small for me, I like a little room in my car in case of an accident, and don't want to be squash like a bug. If somebody hit the bumper on that car, it would look like a pancake.

I meant to answer you last night, but got distracted trying to find my diaries from that time. I must have already packed them. Back in the 70's, I would say most of Kingston was one big shanty town.

The families (related to each other) I was staying with were Rasta and there was a whole lotta smokin going on, if you get my drift. I don't remember if this place had a name, but somehow I don't think so. We were a good bit into the thick of this town, which was (of course) by the foothills of the mountains.

I didn't have any problems while there, but then again, I didn't go looking for trouble. I pretty much stuck with folks who knew where to go and when. I stood out being a red headed white woman, but folks got used to me being there and had a most excellent experience. Goats blood and brain soup was my favorite dish.

I forgot to mention that I know there were places which were referred to as different names, like Garvey, which was heavily Rasta (but I don't think it was a town per se, just a section), but I don't remember the two you mentioned. Could it be a generational thing? You are younger than I am. Maybe it's that fog I lived in while there. Good stuff, man.

Granny, do a Yahoo search for hydrogen gas car kit. It separates the hydrogen from distilled water and injects it into the fuel line and mixes with the gas and air. It's makes the combustion more efficient and helps gas mileage by 10-25% reportedly. A friend of mine is going to try it on his SUV soon. I'll let you know how it goes. A car that burns only hydrogen exists as a prototype only.

I clutch my purse and get off elevators whenever my gut tells me to. I've done it with black folks and I've sho 'nuff done it with white folks, Asians, and Latinos. Human beings are the only species that will ignore danger signals. When alarms go off in my head, I listen and act appropriately. I've lived around enough thugs to know when "something ain't right." They did some study and it showed that a lot of people who have been victims of crime had a feeling something wasn't right but they ignored the feeling.

"I keep telling myself that the frat boy nightmare is almost over, and the country will be back to normal again. But given the two choices how can we go back to normal?"

how about this? there are portions of this strange nation that will support obama--with enthusiasmthat..and i'm talking about places that bear no resemblance in any way to the neighborhood around telegraph and e. 14th.

places like oregon and washington and colorado that are today purple...and somewhat conservative..and mostly white.

those are thge places that will return to normal(ish...) first.

western north carolina, or west virginia, or kentucky?

let's put it this way--there will never be a day when america stops being racist.

there will be days when each of the 300 million of us stop being racist, however; and eventually that reaches a tipping point...and then (hopefully) things don't so much return to normal as they do get better.

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